Leverage
by RosesAndRevolutions
Summary: When President Snow handed Peeta back to the resistance he gave them the one thing they needed most… leverage.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1 (Katniss POV)**

I'm sitting in the hangar, running my fingers over a strand of beads I found in the rubble of District 12. Rosary beads, my mother calls them. An artifact of the culture that used to inhabit this land, the beads were meant to keep the owner accountable to the prayers owed to his god; prayers of forgiveness and thanks. We have no use for religion anymore, there's no sense in believing such a deity would condemn its creation to a life like ours, but I find a strange comfort in holding them.

Thirty minutes ago I was informed that a hovercraft concealed deep in the woods behind President Snow's mansion had departed the Capitol carrying my Peeta. Peeta, the team that rescued him, and Annie, of course. To my left sits Finnick, equally incapable of words. I've gone months without my Peeta, but he's gone years without his Annie. I cannot even imagine what this moment must be like for him. It's quiet in the hanger and we're both siting on empty storage bins, anchoring ourselves in the silence and waiting for hovercraft pad doors to open.

There are scores of people around us, waiting to receive the soldiers and prisoners. From what I know Peeta and Annie are definitely amongst them, as well as Enobaria, another tribute from our second games. No one has made any mention of Johanna so I don't know if she's with them or if she was left behind, but I hope for her sake she's either on this hovercraft or dead. I know that seems horrible, but Johanna's had a hard enough life and as terrible as it might seem all I really want for her is a little bit of peace.

Everyone is shuffling around, trying to make themselves useful while they wait to receive the incoming hovercraft. Dozens of nurses are gathered around a few mobile emergency stations, grabbing handfuls of bandages and syringes and IVs. I don't know what to expect, but they clearly are preparing for the worst. When the hovercraft first arrived at the Capitol I was sitting in the control room with Haymitch and Finnick. I tried to focus on the audio transmitting from Gale's comm link but the sound of screams and gunshots made me nauseous, and before I knew what was happening I was sitting on the floor with my head between my legs while Haymitch coached me through long, deep breathes. Fearing I might withdraw again he led me out of the control room to a chair outside, and promised to let me know if or when they found Peeta. So I can't really say what happened during the rescue but from what I did hear it sounded pretty chaotic.

Another fifteen minutes of silence passes before an alarm starts wailing and the red strobe lights above the door come to life, signaling to everyone in the hangar that the hovercraft has touched down. I pull myself off of the crate, my body so tense I can hardly move, and lean against Finnick for support. Our hands find each other and I relish the warmth radiating from his palm. We both know this is the calm before the storm.

Before I can take another breath, the metal door splits apart and I can see the rush of people exiting the craft. Men and women, bleeding and bandaged, rush to the nurses waiting just behind me. I crane my neck, searching desperately for any sign of Peeta. The doctors in District 13 have been in contact with the recovery team since they left the Capitol and they have already warned me about what to expect. After months of torture he won't be walking himself into my arms, they say, but I don't care. I'll take my Peeta in whatever form he comes to me.

"Make way", I hear voices call. "Make a way, please. We need to get through," they continue to shout.

A gap forms in the crowd and I am able to find the source of the voice. The man, along with three others, is carrying a stretcher down a ramp from the back of the hovercraft. Atop the stretcher lies, unconscious, the source of all of my worries.

"Peeta," I scream, without even realizing it. Before I know it I'm by his side and my eyes are taking in his full appearance. Why is there so much blood? A normal person can't afford to loose that much blood, can they? His face is pale and his clothes have been torn to shreds. I quicken my step to keep pace with the soldiers carrying him and reach my hand down to brush the strands of hair off his forehead. They are caked in blood and sweat and dirt, and I have to tug on my fingers to get them to move all the way through his hair. A clear plastic mask has been fitted over his mouth and nose, feeding oxygen to his greedy lungs, and a hard plastic brace has been wrapped around his neck, keeping his head from making any movement. They cover most of his handsome features but I swear I can make out pain in his unconscious expression. His forehead, normally soft and relaxed when he sleeps, is furrowed and I can see the tension in the muscles underneath his closed eyes. The entire left side of his face is swollen, covered in deep painful bruises, and an angry gash runs just below his right eye. His cheekbones protrude sharply from his face and I can outline every bone in his ribcage as it expands and contracts with each slow, shallow breath. He is so thin. I look down and see that his arms, once strong from kneading dough, are emaciated and his right hand, famous for its ability to paint intricate brush strokes and give the best foot massage in Panem, is resting gently on his hip, bloody and mangled. A small sob escapes from the back of my throat. What have they done to you?

My eyes are still working their way down his broken body when I feel a rough hand on my side and smell the sour scent of cheap whiskey wafting over my left shoulder.

"Let's go," Haymitch whispers, his voice as gentle as I've ever heard it, "You don't need to see this."

He tries to pull me away from Peeta but I resist.

"Yes I do," I counter, with a strength I didn't realize I had. "I have to make sure he's alright," I demand and then shrug his arm off of me. He grabs me again, but this time he stops us both. He takes my face in his hands and forces me to look him in the eyes. It's the first time I've seen any strong emotion in his face.

"He's alive, sweetheart, there's nothing more you can do for him right now. Let the doctors have him, okay?"

"But …" I begin, my eyes welling up with tears. I haven't seen Peeta in so long and I'm not ready to give him up again. I look up to meet Haymitch's eyes and see the shimmer of tears threating to overflow.

"He wouldn't want you to see him like this," he says softly, and I know he's right. Peeta never did like to show weakness.

I look over to the stretcher again to see a team of nurses meeting the four soldiers. They transfer his body to the back of an emergency cart and immediately a nurse shoves a rubber tube down his throat as she begins to pump much-needed air into his lungs. They use straps to secure his limp body to the cart and then they all climb into the back, poking and prodding his body with their hands as they call out words that have no meaning to me. I take my last glimpse of Peeta, as one of the medics climbs into the front seat of the cart and drives out of the hangar, towards the hospital wing.

Numb, I allow Haymitch to lead me back to my living quarters. He opens the door and I sit down in the chair beside the small table in my room. I can't get my mind off of Peeta. Is he going to be okay? What are the doctors doing to him? Is he in terrible pain? Will he hate us all when he wakes up? For the past few months I haven't been able to escape the guilt of knowing that I was rescued while he was left to die. I hate Coin and her agenda and her willingness to sacrifice anyone for her stupid cause. Peeta is such a better person than me. Anyone would tell you that. His life is worth so much more than mine.

Haymitch hands me two of the sleeping pills Dr. Aurelius prescribed at my first meeting with him and then guides me over to the bed. Once I lay down, he dims the lights and pulls the covers over me.

"I'm going to go talk to the nurses and see how he's doing," he says. "Once he's stable and allowed to have visitors, I'll come get you. Okay?"

The best I can do is nod. These pills don't take long to work.

"Get some rest, sweetheart. I'll see you in a few hours," I hear Haymitch whisper as he quietly closes the door. I allow my eyes to drift shut and try to not think about the terrible nightmares I know I'm going to have.

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When I wake up, Haymitch is nowhere to be found. I look over at my clock to see its been almost 12 hours since I first laid down. All I can assume is that the bastard's probably off getting drunk somewhere so I decide to leave without him. Anxious to see Peeta I throw on the same clothes from yesterday, which spent the night in a messy pile on my floor. I don't even stop in the bathroom to clean myself up before I rush out my door and off to the hospital wing. Surely he's awake by now.

The paint on the wall is colored to distinguish specific areas of District 13's underground compound. Grey designates living areas, red is for dining, green is for recreation areas, blue is for space designated to the military, and yellow is for medical facilities. There are more, I'm sure, but those are the only areas I frequent. Unfortunately for my patience and my nerves, I have to pass through grey, red, and green before I can get to yellow.

As soon as the walls turn yellow, I attach myself to the first nurse I find and beg her to tell me where they're keeping Peeta. She says that she doesn't know specifically, apparently the leaders here in District 13 are trying their best to keep Peeta and Annie's return under wraps, but she heard a rumor they were treating him on the fourth floor. She points me toward the nearest staircase.

I make my way down to the fourth floor and weave through the seemingly endless number of hallways until I catch sight of military guards keeping post outside two doors in the distance. That must be them. There's a window looking into each room in the hospital ward. Most have the curtains drawn for privacy but the first of the two guarded rooms I approach gives a view of a petite, frail woman curled up on her side beneath the sheets of the sterile hospital bed. Tubes run in and out of her fragile arms but the most striking sight is the handsome man in the chair beside her bed. His forehead is pressed against hers and one of his large, strong hands covering hers as the other wraps around her quivering shoulders. No sound penetrates the thick pane of glass, but I can see tears streaming down both of their faces. The sight is so raw and so private that I can't help but feel like an intruder. The contrast between the Finnick the public thinks they know and the true Finnick is striking and has never been more evident than right now. Deciding to give them the privacy they so deserve I keep walking to the next guarded door.

It's only 20 feet away but I could swear it takes me an hour to get there. My heart is thumping in my chest and halfway to the window I realize that maybe I don't want to see what's one the other side of that window. Peeta's always been the strong one, the optimistic one. What if I don't have what it takes to be that for him now? Gathering the courage, I walk the last few steps to the window, take a deep breath, and look inside.

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**I am thinking about turning this into a full story. What do y'all think?****  
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	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2 (Katniss POV)**

_Gathering the courage, I walk the last few steps to the window, take a deep breath, and look inside. The room is empty._

The room is empty. Empty. I can't believe it. Letting go of the breath I was holding I walk down to the reception area and look for someone that might be able to tell me where they're keeping him. It's nearly three in the morning and there is no one behind the desk. I look at the board hanging on the wall behind the desk and see a long list of room numbers but nothing that would help me identify which one belongs to Peeta. Frustrated I keep walking, looking for anyone and out of the corner of my eye I see small room with couches. It's a waiting area, sparsely furnished with light grey furniture, and passed out across one of them is my former mentor. I walk into the room and kneel down beside the occupied couch.

"Haymitch," I whisper into his ear, "Wake up."

He is out cold so I use my hand to shake him awake. Bad idea. At this point I should know never to startle a fellow victor. After weeks of playing a game of kill or be killed it's in our instincts to attack. The next thing I know he has my wrist in one hand and the other around my neck.

"Haymitch," I whisper, my voice straining from the pressure on my throat, "It's Katniss."

It takes a moment to register but I can see the recognition coming over his eyes as he loosens the grip around my neck. Taking a few gasping breathes, I give him the worst look I can conjure at that moment. He reeks of alcohol and I see a half empty bottle he must have smuggled in from the Capitol peeking out from his pocket. "Idiot", he mumbles under his breath and takes a seat back on the couch. Deciding to forgive him for almost choking me to death, I walk over and sit down beside him.

"Have you heard any news," I ask, trying not to sound as desperate as I feel, "I can't find anyone to talk to".

"No, I haven't," he replies, "Not since they took him back for surgery."

That has been almost twelve hours ago. What could have happened to him that would require twelve hours of surgery? Haymitch can sense my unease and pulls my head onto his shoulder.

"Come here, sweetheart," he whispers, as I let myself relax into him, "Our boy is strong. If anyone can pull through its him. Okay?"

"Okay," I respond, trying to muster up a small smile for Haymitch. He may have his vices but in his own way Haymitch has always been kind to me and Peeta. Sometimes I wonder why he never had kids of his own but then I remember that to have kids you have to be sober for at least part of the day, so I can see how that never fit in well with his life goals. For now we both sit in silence, trying to keep our nerves from getting the better of us and appreciating the comfort of the other beside us.

I'm staring at the stark, while wall in front of me, starting to doze off, when I hear the soft tap of feet on the cold concrete floor. The sound gets louder until it stops altogether, just outside waiting room door. It must be someone coming with news on Peeta. I jump up from the couch, shaking Haymitch from his stupor, and rush over to the glass door. All doctors in District 13 dress the same, black shirts, black pants, grey shoes, and a long white coat, and this one is no exception. The doctor lets himself into the waiting room and sits down on the couch, across from Haymitch.

I take a seat next to him again and find myself subconsciously gripping the cushion beneath me. The couches are worn from countless people sitting where I am right now, waiting anxiously to hear what has happened to someone that they love. There is a small hole worn beneath my fingers and I rip the edges of the hole even wider, trying to reach the coarse cotton stuffing inside. Realizing District 13 probably sends you to prison for destroying their precious property, I put my hands in my lap and wait while the doctor shuffles the papers on her clipboard.

This doctor, as clinical and dry as any I've met during my time here, takes a deep breath and then looks Haymitch and I in the eyes.

"As you know," she says, "Mr. Mellark has been through a great deal of trauma these past few months."

No shit. Is it really necessary to state the obvious?

She takes a glance down at her papers and continues. "When we received him, a quick assessment revealed several broken bones in various stages of healing. These range from small fractures in his facial bones, to breaks in several of his ribs, to extensive damage to the bones in his right hand and wrist. We were able to break and reset those bones in surgery however that damage is many months old and I can not guarantee that Mr. Mellark will ever fully recover the use of his hand."

The doctor stares at me when she says this and I feel like I've been punched in the gut; I have to look away. Peeta needs his hand for all of the things in life that he loves: painting, baking, taking care of me. It's selfish but right now all I want are his strong arms wrapped around me, shielding me from this heartache. I take a deep breath to calm myself and then look back at her, willing her to continue.

"When he arrived," she says, "his prosthetic, which had been fused into his nervous system, was no longer attached to the upper portion of his left leg. From what we were able to deduce it must have been forcibly removed. We were able to repair most of the resulting damage and when Mr. Mellark is healed we can outfit him with a new attachment. It won't integrate as seamlessly as his previous leg but it will allow him full mobility."

The doctor looked down again at the list on her clipboard and continued with her description of Peeta's injuries.

"As I'm sure you noticed when he first arrived, Mr. Mellark is severely malnourished. According to records we were able to retrieve from the Capitol he is nearly 20kg lighter than when he first entered the games, and this is putting a considerable amount of stress on his heart. We have him on a ventilator to ease some of the effort and we've inserted a tube directly into his stomach to force calorie dense substance into his system and help bring his weight up. I am aware that Mr. Mellark has suffered heart failure on several previous occasions, however I do expect his heart to make an almost complete recovery."

Leg, hand, and heart, I count on the list of things that could be permanently damaged. All because of me. All because I was too selfish to let myself die in the first games and unknowingly became a part of the rebellion that ended up being the cause of hundreds, maybe even thousands of deaths. Deaths that include Peeta's entire family. I wonder how long I will have to wait before he's ready to hear that truth. There's silence in the room right now and I feel Haymitch reach over and take one of my hands in his, giving it a soft squeeze. My whole body feels numb, trying to force away the pain of hearing the horrible things that have been done to my Peeta, and I can't even bring myself to look back at the doctor. She clears her throat and begins to speak again.

"There's one more thing I should tell you. When Mr. Mellark arrived there was a large venous catheter inserted just below his left collar bone," she described, tapping that location on her own chest. "We use these when we want to administer regular doses of medicine over a long period of time. I'm not sure what purpose this served his attendants in the Capitol but we were able to swipe some residue from inside the catheter and it is currently in our lab for analysis. After discovering the fractures to his facial bones we scanned his brain to look for any damage and found a small object embedded into his brain stem. It appears to be similar in size and shape to the mount of my palm," she explains, rubbing the area where the thumb connects to the base of her hand, "with extensions protruding into his brain tissue. From what we can tell it is not causing him any harm at the moment. Given that we are hundreds of miles from where he was being held and far enough underground to block any external electrical signals, we are going to consider that device inert for the moment. My preference would be to remove it as quickly as possible but professionally I can't recommend any further surgical procedures until his body has had some chance to heal. Once we see a marked improvement in his condition we will schedule a surgery to have the implant removed."

She took another long, deep breath, and for the first time I can see something resembling pity in her eyes.

"I can't imagine how difficult this must be for you right now," she continued, "but I do have hope that with a lot of hard work and patience, Mr. Mellark will make a recovery. I can't offer you a guarantee that he will be entirely the person you knew before his time in the Capitol however from everything I've read and seen about him, he's a fighter," she paused, looking between Haymitch and I. "He's going to need a lot of help, and I think it's best…"

She's interrupted by a knock at the door. It is one of the orderlies who, looking completely exhausted, opens the door to hand her a folder and then slips quietly back into the hallway. Haymitch and I sit there in silence as she reads through the contents of the folder, grasping each other's hand. I have no idea how to react to everything she's just said.

Part of me wants to vomit, part of me wants to open every door in this hospital unit until I find Peeta, but the largest part of me wants to hide in a closet until Peeta is well enough to come find me. Why is my first instinct always to run? Why is it so easy for Peeta to be there for me but it's so hard for me to find the courage to be there for him when he needs me the most? I can't handle seeing people in pain. When my mother would take patients at the house I would always find myself conveniently busy outside until they left or she put them to bed in the spare room. I don't know if its because I feel helpless – for all my mother tried to teach me I just could never remember all the remedies she would spout off – or if its because I just can't find it in myself to have compassion.

"It looks like Peeta's been moved to a room in the critical care unit so he can be closely monitored," the doctor speaks again, interrupting my thoughts. "He is under very heavy sedation but I can give you a few minutes to sit with him if you would like," she offers.

I look to her and nod, not trusting my mouth to form words, and then follow Haymitch as he leads me out of the waiting area. The doctor walks down the hallway, towards the guarded room I found empty earlier. As we pass Annie's room Finnick looks up from her bedside to give me a sad smile. I'm so focused on gathering the strength to see Peeta that I can't even respond, so I look away.

The curtains on his window are drawn and as we stand in front of the door to his room, I know it isn't empty. The doctor knocks twice on the door and then cracks the door to peak her head inside. The nurse inside declares that Peeta is decent, and then opens the door for Haymitch and I to enter.

"I can give you 30 minutes," the doctor says to me, "and then the nurses need some time to work."

I take a few long, slow breaths and then take the last five steps into his room.

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**I hope y'all are enjoying this so far. I'd like to say a gigantic thank you to those of you (Trude, Jesusfollower97, HelloEverlarkForever, and 2 anonymous peeps) who have reviewed this story. I really appreciate hearing from you!****  
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**Thanks for reading and please review!**

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**P.S. I was excited to post this chapter before I left for the weekend and realized I forgot to add this little bit at the end. I apologize if those of you lovely people with subscriptions are getting a notification. Thanks!**


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